It is time for some real player power. For the entire off-season, the
never-ending soap opera of the Barclays Premier League has revolved around
unsettled footballers and their hamfisted attempts to engineer the transfer
of their dreams. “I’m A Footballer, Get Me Out Of Here,” you might call it.

The pictures of Luis Suárez back in training with Liverpool’s first-team squad
yesterday morning, just before Wayne Rooney travelled with the Manchester
United party for their opening assignment away to Swansea City this evening,
seemed to signal a realisation that it is time to get down to business.